ITV Logic - the land that time forgot

Re: the belated shift of the ITV schedules last night:

You [ITV] land - for your opening salvo of a new series of a show long past its prime - an actor who can cause swoons and cheers just by turning up. He may work for 'the other side' but hey, even you can't be that cranky since he is, clearly, one of the current hot properties of TV-land. This should be a thing you want to work in your favour. You know, maximise your audience. Dare I say that is the purpose of choosing your guests?

You [ITV] probably really hate YouTube for posting copyrighted - yet never released on any formal format - interviews. Could we beat the sneaky young things who would scoop or limit our viewers by posting the interview within hours onto YouTube? Shall we scupper their efforts to video and then post our gem?

Cloud doubts that ITV would have thought it through enough to have shifted the timing of Parky featuring David Tennant just enough so that anyone who set a video would later discover they have missed the DT alone segment and are now lumbered with the interaction with other guest stars. [Although given that David Mitchell was also a guest it wasn't all bad].

Anyway, here's my thoughts.

WHAT WERE YOU PLAYING AT ITV????!!!!

I mean, seriously, ITV, do you just want to piss off your remaining audience? You have a shite reality music show (Grease is certainly NOT the word by all accounts) and you clearly cannot compete with Who. You get a chance to capture some of that audience by judicious scheduling of some Tennant Extra just as we will go two weeks before Who returns. And what do you do? You shift the schedule for no clear reason and with limited notice - there was a very grumpy announcement at the david-tennant.com fansite at 22.10 to say that they had just realised that Parky would be starting a full 15 mins ahead of schedule (and these are the folks who would have spotted if Teletext or Ceefax had clearly indicated a schedule change after the TV line-ups were printed in papers and weekly listings but before the programme schedule started).

Hmmm. Just spotted that highlights are apparently to come later to the Parky website. Harumph. I hope they get utterly stamped on by YouTuber users.


On the up side though, I actually caught part of the DT interview. See, despite Cloud hating Parky (ITV-Parky being even more sycophantically awful than it ever was in its BBC hey-day) he let me turn over to ITV during the evening. [It's not my favourite interview show either, though he can have some good guests]. Funnily, this was an instinctive action on my part, and with no regard to the clock - I couldn't see it [was DT sending me a psychic message to turn over? Why didn't he get me to have enough nouse to find a video??!]

Anyway, there is DT! I got to watch about 5 mins before an advert break came in during which time DT awkwardly basked in the heat of an audience dominated by swooning DT fans. He spoke of his initial hesitation for taking on the role of Who (the familiar tale of "Who am I kidding?! Of course I'll take it!") and gave some nice recollections of doing Casanova, including recalling the game gals who were trooped on to be filmed for the quick succession series of conquests that he had recounted to the attentive/disgusted Edith.

There was also a discussion of acting 'climaxes' which probably produced more wet seats amongst the audience at Parky than has ever been experienced there. Let's say that as exhilerating as that was to hear him talking about that I could have done without being in the position of watching it whilst sat next to Cloud. That would have worked so much better with me watching it on my own on video.... It'll be interesting if THAT is a bit that they highlight on the Parky website...

Favourite TV characters

Following on from Joss Whedon over at Whedonesque giving his favourite 25 TV characters (as reported by lovely MediumRob), I thought that I should offer a list of my own.

I've thought about it of course, but I've tried to limit myself by giving myself just 15 mins to write the post. I've took a bit longer than than that (it took 7 songs on i-Tunes) but the longer I spend the more likely it was to take over my day.

Anyway, I get to include reference to the Whedonverse - a freedom available to me as I didn't write them. I've also stuck with those created for TV (so no Casanova folks as MUCH as we loved that!), even though that left off a lot of well-portrayed characters who came from elsewhere (Andy Dalziel, for example, or Edward Petherbridge's Lord Peter Wimsey [I'm re-reading some Sayers at the mo which is why that's in my mind]). And although obviously The Doctor is one of THE best TV figures ever created, since the character changes somewhat with every regeneration I've left that one off the list. I also gave considerable thought to disentangling characters from actors: so as much as I have loved performances by people such as Dougie Henshall (Psychos, Kid in the Corner), David Tennant (Blackpool) and Ken Stott(Messiah, The Vice, Takin' Over the Asylum), Christopher Eccleston (Our Friends in the North, The Second Coming), and David Morrissey (Holding On, Blackpool), I've come to the reluctant conclusion that in most instances I was attracted by the performance and the actor's inhabitation and not just the character.

So in thinking out this list I've gone for characters that perhaps anyone else might have played (because the writing was so good) but which had the good fortune of great casting to be given to the best person for the job.

1. Willow Rosenberg from Buffy the Vampire Slayer - because, well pretty obvious really
2. Josh Lyman from The West Wing - for being a volatile heart on his sleeve guy
3. Dr. Dana Scully from The X-Files - for being able to keep a straight face even when the plot went utterly bonkers and her Carter-penned soliloquies became unbearably portentious (you should see her as a double act with Mulder really I guess as a great character)
4. Brian Topp from Spaced - for anger, pain and painting
5. Lisa Simpson from the Simpsons - for being smart and surviving
6. Munch from Homocide: Life on the Street / Law & Order: Special Victims Unit / X-Files 100th episode - for being so fantastically conspiratorial
7. Gregory House from House - because I just never got Jeeves & Wooster so I have NO problem with the accent and love smart characters
8. Det. Robert Goren from Law & Order: Criminal Intent - because again, smart guys
9. CJ Cregg from The West Wing - because she was just so incredible
10. Spike from Buffy the Vampire Slayer/Angel - for having such a great character arc and huge numbers of great lines
11. Dr. McCartney from Green Wing - for being quick-witted, but stupid in love
12. Dr. Joel Fleishman from Northern Exposure - for being sweet (though its a tough call against DJ Chris...)
13. (Ale)Xander Lavelle Harris from Buffy - because for all his faults he and his humour remained adorable
14. Bernard Black from Black Books - wickedly funny
15. Edmund Blackadder - for sustained historical wit and ingenuity
16. Sue White from Green Wing - for being surreal
17. Abby from NCIS - goth girl geek!
18. Dr. Perry Cox from Scrubs - for being sarky and soft-hearted
19. Father Dougal McGuire from Father Ted - for managing to make confusion so appealing
20. Mal Reynolds from Firefly - for courage and stupidity
21. Dharma Finkelstein Montgomery from Dharma and Greg - because whilst the actress may be a scary kook, Dharma was a great kook character (especially when having eaten lots of sugar)
22. Jane Tennison from Prime Suspect - for really taking 'cop shows' to another level
23. Gil Grissom from CSI - for just being ineffably cool
24. Niles Crane from Frasier - for being wimpish to the extreme
25. Lois from Malcolm in the Middle - for somehow holding it together

I could have gone for any number of others instead or as well as these. Any number of great characters from the Whedonverse, or The West Wing, let alone all the random residual memory characters from my TV viewings (Ilya Kuryakin! Burnside from Sandbaggers! Tom and Ruth from Spooks! Marty Hopkirk - the first TV programme I remember watching! Joy Merryweather from Drop the Dead Donkey! Earl Hickey! Francis Urquart!).

It's no good, this list would change in a minute. And excuse the lack of links but I wanted it posted.

UPDATE: MediumRob has his own list which only serves to highlight how partial my list was and how incomplete and how I managed to omit so many great characters. Sheesh, I mean, I doubt my mother will ever forgive me for forgetting Avon from Blake's 7. She's gonna start haunting me I tell ya...

Emily's Open Letter

Stumbled over this and I hope the lovely Emily in Hollywood will forgive me for posting it here:

Dear Mr. Tennant,

I'm writing from Hollywood, California, because your star's rising so brightly I can see it from here, and it's gorgeous, and it's blinding, and I thought you should know what it looks like from 6000 miles. This is also a love letter.

From today I give you a year, maybe eighteen months till you're a household name, top-billed, in the States as well as abroad. Here's what's gonna happen.

They'll make you work out, you beautiful lanky stringbean, and you'll get biceps and a chest and then they'll make you do (more) shirtless scenes. Then you're gonna cultivate an American accent. They'll tell you to do it because more roles'll open up for you. We'll tell you to do it because we want to hear you sound like us, and you'll do it because you got a bit of the cowboy in ya and a damned good ear. Take it for a test drive on Doctor Who this year, because in the age of BBC America you've got a bigger captive audience than Tom Baker ever had, and in a week you'll end up on YouTube.

Next you get a breakthrough hit. Something with critical appeal on a low budget, this year's Trainspotting. I bet the scripts are coming in already, and you're with ICM, so you'll pick the right one. Then it's a question of do you want to do the mainstream summer American romantic comedy they send ya, or do you wait for the villain role in the smaller American thriller? And the girls join the gays, as they tend to, and next thing you're beating out Brad Pitt in every poll there is. Glossy magazines that smell like perfume will call you things like "The Scottish Sensation" and the Desperate Housewives will start fantasizing about you. Quite possibly call you to offer you a six-episode arc.

I just met you this past year because I'm a geek and a fangirl and I watched Eccleston in Who, and, like everyone, thought I'd never get over him once he left. (If you're playing the home game, you had me in three episodes. I marked the moment, it's at the end of "School Reunion" when we get our very first giant Tennant grin, breaking around "my Sarah Jane!")

Since then I've made a point of getting hold of screeners for Casanova, Blackpool, Secret Smile. I watched 2005's Quatermass for you, and the internet provided old episodes of Taking over the Asylum where they noticed you first, all limbs and energy and that weird wisdom in your eyes. You like props and stage business. You like smiles that break from one corner of your mouth to the other, like a wave. You like to touch people. You like to pace, to sit down and get right back up again. You like to cross a room and then look back over your shoulder. You bite your upper lip and shoot a knowing look. Most white guys bite their lower lips, but you've redefined mouth business for a whole new generation, with that pop of your lower jaw and the way the tip of your tongue folds up against the roof of your mouth. I suspect some of that's you, just as I suspect that even when you're not performing your face tells a hell of a story.

So I did twelve years of Tennant in about two months, real time. I watched you grow up and blow up and explode on the screen as Casanova, as Carlisle, as the Doctor. This time you took the slower path, and I tripped through the pages of your book and fell for you as I watched you blow the roof off the place.

The reviews I've read describe your Doctor as quirky, electric, I've even heard "waspish," but if you ask me (and boy how you didn't) I think the key element you bring to the character's what we saw in the very first five minutes we had him on screen -- he's a fellow who's hop, hop, hopping for his life, in perpetual motion because if he ever stops, even for a second, he'll be forced to come to terms with the weight of his 900 years and all his angst and guilt. And so you spin him across the screen with a sort of desperate mania, like the guy who hides his emotions behind humor or the guy who talks too fast because he doesn't want to hear what you're gonna say if he lets you interrupt. Actually, it's kind of chilling. One gets the feeling that just beneath the surface, Tennant's Doctor, for all his infinite adaptibility, is about one good guilt trip away from smiting the universe with his wrath for all of its injustices. Kind and passionate, yeah, but don't ever mistake that for nice.

All this in sharp contrast to your Casanova, though on the surface they do share a sort of Peter Pannish irrepressibility, because you somehow managed to make Casanova -- while entirely a rogue -- the domestic sort. Here's a man who, despite appearances, really does just want that perfect love affair, to run off with his heart's desire and settle down for a life of domestic wedded bliss. And how you managed to do that while keeping him a self-centered cad is just another little indication of why I spent the last two months seeking out every credit of yours I could get my hands on. Casanova who wants nothing more than for his son to be proud of him, or nothing more than to play house with Henriette, and still manages to botch the whole thing up because he's crippled by his own need for instant gratification and because he's got that magpie-like attraction to the shiny and new and untried.

And then Carlisle's a third sort entirely, probably the laziest character I've seen you play. And of course it's not really laziness he's got, but what you present as sort of a combination of complete worldly entitlement and a sort of boredom with everything around him. Your Carlisle slouches through his life completely convinced he'll get whatever he's got his eye on without much effort on his part. When other folks talk, he lets his mind wander. He lopes around with that air of bored confidence, but then, in a really phenomenal performance, you litter all that confidence with nervous behavior, the eye poking, the oral fixation. Like even Carlisle doesn't know how insecure he really is. And it works for him, both the insecurity and the overconfidence; he gets his man, he gets the girl, he's a corrupt antihero and we all root for him anyway.

In other words, you've impressed the socks off me. And that doesn't mean anything, I mean, my opinion, as I'm not famous, or noteworthy, or an asshole, but I'm brighter than most and I've got discerning taste and I'm not even an Anglophile; I'm a dyed-in-the-wool Jewish New Yorker cum-Angeleno, and I think you are the greatest thing to come along since belly lox on a bagel. And not just because you're a beautiful man, which you are, from the loud arch of your eyebrow to your toothy grin that can stop a girl's heart, ka-thud, just like that. And not just because you're a legitimate talent, a genuine actor's actor, an alive, electric performer with a freakish ability to shift from beaming to broken or from charming to creepy with a curl of your lip. Because one bit of stage business isn't enough for you, and they may call you spastic and jumpy but every single one of those movements is controlled, elegant. You slide into your roles like you were born in them, which, I suppose, in the Doctor's case, you were. You make good decisions. You see the whole picture. And I've grown absolutely addicted to watching you do it, and falling just a little bit in love with you besides.

Not even just because you're a Socialist, or you did 7:84 or can probably match me at West Wing trivia, or because you still believe in agitprop, though those are points in your favor. And I didn't fall for you just because you're six feet and can't weigh more than a buck fifty but you move like a dancer and your head's always square on your shoulders and you can't teach that kind of confidence, that kind of posture, that's just born, and either you got it or you don't, and you've got it in spades.

But mostly I'm impressed from 6000 miles away, and I felt the need to write to you, because you're taking this in stride, all of it, hop hop hopping for your life and making good choices and living in the present and building a career not by cutthroat ambition but by sheer talent, each role coming out of the next because we want you, and not the other way around. And you say now that you don't have a five year plan, and I believe you, because I've read articles from '04 where you mentioned trying to get your agent to put you up for a walk-on role on Who. But a year from now you're going to belong to the world, The Next Big Scot, because the scripts are only going to come in faster after Christmas, after Recovery, after whatever's next, and I'm gonna miss you.

Scotland's known you forever, but we just got hold of you over here across the pond, and we're proprietary! I love that this year you're property of the geeks, the fanboys and fangirls and the Pink Paper gays, all of us who always jump on board just a little bit quicker than the rest of the world, all of us who know how to see magic in the mundane and who saw it in your amazing face. We're a clever bunch, geeks and artists, and we usually find the cool stuff first.

We're on the brink, you know? Doesn't it feel like apocalypse weather? This big world and my country's diabolical administration and the conflict that arises when a planet gets too small for its population? Good time for agitprop and a great time for geeks -- we made the microphones and the internet and the podiums and now we've got 'em in our hot little hands. So what do we SAY? What do we DO? How do we use what we got to change the world for the better? Is it any wonder I fantasize about this year's love in the form of a Socialist Scot with a talent that even The Man can't keep down?

But that's also why this is a love letter, because I'm aching for our lost year, because next time you're in LA you'll be bigger than Brad Pitt and rich as Croesus, and I'm never gonna get the chance to work with you, to use your energy and vast, sprawling talent to tell my stories. And we'll never get that drink.

And it woulda been a good drink, David, it woulda been awesome.

Maybe I'm wrong, and you'll stay staunchly where you are, the pride of Scotland and the Pink Paper heartthrob for five more series of Who, and then maybe after that you'll team up with Russell Davies and write your own pilot, and star in that, and spend some more decades with the RSC and follow the path of other actorly British sorts, and you'll crossover to the states when you're seventy and playing Dumbledore in Harry Potter 21.

But either way, I hope you feel the potential, the excitement, the fire of your shooting star. Because from over here, it is absolutely incredible to watch, and I can't look away.

The best of luck to you in everything you do. Come to LA and I'll show you a good time.

Kinda sweet ain't it?

This weekend...

I have been mostly watching:

Casanova (all three episodes over three days: last year we did a marathon run of the lot in one night...)

Doctor Who: Christmas Invasion, Tooth and Claw, School Reunion, and Girl in the Fireplace, plus Fear Her (H had missed it last week) and of course Army of Ghosts*

Selected Douglas Henshall moments from: Essential Poems, If Only, This Year's Love, and Orphans

Extended edition of Gladiator plus selected scenes with commentary

Yes, yes, I know, I didn't watch the footie. Frankly I was depressed anough about the prospects for the game BEFORE it started. Sadly, it lived up (down?) to all my worst fears.

Sorry JJ.

*Holy crap, need another post for THAT one!

1000 posts: The Story so far

The lovely Anna gave us a summary of posts when she hit the 100 mark: having hit the 1000 (my god, such waffling!) I feel the urge to do something similar. But obviously I am far more gabby so mine is very long!

So here is a review of the posts so far on a month by month basis, picking out regular topics and those posts that either drew the most comments or were just plain entertaining to me.

Now this doesn't quite add up to the 1000 but it gives you an approximate idea ...

September 2004: 17 posts
Typical posts:

• On William Shatner covering Pulp;


• preview comment for a play starring Douglas Henshall;


• ravings about The West Wing;


• a quote from Buffy

October 2004: 19 posts

• selections of dialogue from The West Wing;


• a review of Sons & Daughters with the Delgados at the Rescue Rooms, Nottingham;


• mention of Peggy Guggenheim;


• Rullsenberg ranting on pensions and education;


• the review for Darwin in Malibu, the aforementioned play starring lovely Dougie Henshall;


• the death of John Peel

November 2004: 5 posts
NB my dad died at the start of the month and blogging was therefore very light

• a review of The Roots in concert (possibly the first post to actually draw a comment from someone other than Cloud! Thanks Lily!);


• the first of several very long and ultimately very boring posts on the Channel 4 Ultimate Film list - you know the one where you got obscure black and white films appear in it rather than the latest blockbuster...?

December 2004: 6 posts

• more ultimate film list nonsense with me remarking whether I had seen the aforementioned films or not - damn I was a boring blogger back then: in defense I had recently become an orphan;


• still, for some reason, one of those darn posts did draw another new reader: the lovely Casyn: I miss Casyn's posts...


• review of "I love/heart Huckabees";


• praise for Blackpool

January 2005: 49 posts
Hmmm... do you think I may have started with a new resolution on blogging for 2005?

• the declaration regarding the chick flicks article (still in production and heaven only knows when/whether that will progress...);


• some post-rock recommendations


• film reviews for End of the Century: The Ramones, and the fabulous and bedazzling Lemony Snicket;


• my first thoughts on the Norm Blog Song Poll;


• something about a Scottish bloke who isn't called Douglas...


• a death in British surrealism


• my first post to be picked up and linked from the incredibly prolific Norm on moments in movies that make me cry: it remains one of the most regularly viewed posts even if it drew NO comments;


• poetry and story songs;


• a rant on inheritance tax;


• Dougie and St Mirren [dare I hope for this season...?];


• praise for The Rotter's Club on TV

February 2005: 57 posts

• posts about comedy, both British and American;


• predictions for the 2005 BAFTAs and results plus Oscar predictions;


• the first Obscure Songs posts [yes, I do intend to return to that post list];


• a post link to the Rullsenberg Normblog Questionnaire;


• me rushing to record Dalziel and Pascoe due to the unexpected appearance of this name in the credits;


• debates on using Ms or Miss


• a reappraisal of Heaven's Gate;

March 2005: 40 posts

• praise for Kelley Armstrong's vampire/werewolf/witch novels;


• pretentious movies (sorry Dougie);


• great graffiti on political poster boards;


• debates about time travel


• the brilliance of Buffy and the film Sneakers;


• the encounter with the weird and wonderful world of Misty's Big Adventure

April 2005: 54 posts

• Casanova, Casanova...;


• the election of 2005 and political matters;


• the first (?) of many many book memes


• introduction to the world of Clare and her excellent book;


• the death of Andrea Dworkin (again another well-connected post);


• Rullsenberg rantings on matters like class, spurring Duff debates;


• Rufus and all his glory, including leading to the inclusion of Anna;


• a partial review of BAAS 2005

May 2005: 58 posts

• more debates on class and education getting people in a dither;


• persuasive tactics for voting (aka appealing to my lust);


• music lists in great number;


• the scariness of Doctor Who;


• a way for living;


• movies and their watchability;


• Clare's interview of me and my love for Pulp;


• Spacey in The Philadelphia Story

June 2005: 67 posts

July 2005: 52 posts

August 2005: 42 posts

September 2005: 82 posts

October 2005: 81 posts

November 2005: 93 posts

December 2005: 90 posts

January 2006: 81 posts

February 2006: 70 posts

March 2006 (so far): 39 posts

Predictions as at Friday 17 March: observers may spot that the remaining months get much more silly, with increasing numbers of short posts and lots of them linking to Marie... Wonder why???

The West Wing Season 6, Casanova and Marie

Lacking the ability to have Freeview in my house - unless we wish to view the special pixilated version - I do not have to worry about missing out on the West Wing season 6, especially as I smartly purchased it for my friend Helen Lisette for her birthday. I also have a working video recorder and a DVD copy of Casanova (ooh yes).

Thus I do not share Marie's predicament regarding clashes of channels, bad mullet haircuts and not owning the DVD.

Marie: I think you should assume that if your family failed to take the necessary hints for Xmas, me and Rosby will shake tins to raise the cash to buy you a copy of Casanova for you to watch all for yourself...

Being cheered up right proper

This found via here made me smile. As did this.

Vote vote vote!

You may choose something like this or this, but whatever sailed your boat this year, VOTE!

TV Programmes (my second attempt)

I had a great post worked out in response to this. Blogger lost it. I have just resisted the urge to throw my cronky office computer from the window on a hot sunny day (even though I know its Blogger and not the computer).

GRRR

Recent / ongoing

* Blackpool (these boots...)
* Casanova (a confection of delight and tears)
* CSI (can I have all three versions?)
* Dr Who (recent series... and hopefully the next)
* Green Wing (just bonkers and hilarious: DVD btw anyone... anyone? Channel 4 have you gone to sleep?)
* House (best doctor in years and a smart character)
* Law and Order: Criminal Intent (smart character, again: even if Private Pyle all growed-up has nicked that quirk of tipping his head on one side from Clooney in "ER")
* Scrubs (Dr. Cox... 'nuff said)
* State of Play (script, actors, genius)
* The West Wing (the parallel world)

Past stuff: gone but not forgotten

* 24 (just Season 1: season 2 had its moments, but it going on and on - and on Sky - I've lost track. Prime 'climb-the-sofa' material)
* Buffy (can I have a slice of the Whedonverse - to include "Angel" as well please?)
* Dharma and Greg (I blame having cable TV for a while: I loved this show)
* Northern Exposure (before Dr. Joel and Maggie really got it together)
* Our Friends (in the South - aka "Holding On" / and the 'original' one, "Our Friends in the North")
* Psychos ("Did you like my flowers....?")
* Seinfeld ("Believe it or not, George isn't at home...")
* Spaced (worth repeated viewing: get them DVDs!)
* The Vice (Ken Stott: hangdog and emotionally tortured - just what he does best)
* The X-Files (because in less than a year we watched every single episode - even the end of season 9...)

Honourable mentions

Blackadder, Curb Your Enthusiasm, ER, Father Ted, Frasier, Our Mutual Friend, Quantum Leap, The Sopranos (early seasons), This Life

Further back in time

The Sandbaggers (one of the few programmes I recall from my younger days)

Picked up 'Casanova'

As in the DVD...

Oh, what's the point...

Even Cloud said I'd only brought it for the Easter Egg of David Tennant (there isn't one btw).

What little reputation I had lays in tatters at my feet.

Casanova and conclusion

Am still wiping the tears from my eyes at last night's poignant conclusion to RTD's Casanova: certainly getting an award from me for one of the most delightful pieces of TV this year. It has been a magical spectacle. Smart, savvy, sexy (in different ways for both incarnations of the central character, though the dashing young blue eyes have it for me), and utterly compelling.

I know it's "more stuff" but I'd like to take pleasure in watching it again.

Casanova

If you missed this on BBC3, then please say you have invested the time to watch it now that it has quickly come to BBC1. In much the same way as I grinned through Misty's Big Adventure, this production just made me gleeful. It was smart, funny and emotionally connected with me. Also, David Tennant as the young Casanova is superb and gives dashing Peter O'Toole a real run for his acting money. Glorious. Why no due date for DVD release? Am still hanging for Blackpool to get a release as well. As I am for Holding On (1997 and counting). AND Green Wing... turning into a DVD grumbler...